Massenet: Ballet Music (XRCD24/K2 review)

Le Cid. Also, Scenes Pittoresques; The Last Sleep of the Virgin; Offenbach: La Belle Helene; Berlioz: Dance of the Sylphs; Minuet of the Will-O’-the-Wisps. Louis Fremaux, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. Klavier/JVC VICJ-035-1107.

By John J. Puccio

To be honest, I don’t think audio recording has improved all that much since the introduction of home stereo almost seventy years ago. Sure, there have been some big changes, like Dolby noise reduction and digital engineering, but they haven’t always resulted in actual improvements. The real improvements have come in mastering techniques, transferring original recordings to LP, CD, SACD, or download. Here is where a number of companies over the years came up with unique strategies to perfect the art. In the old vinyl days, Sheffield Labs, for instance, had their direct to disc masters, and Mobile Fidelity had their half-speed remasters. Then came the digital age, and audiophile companies had to come up with other ploys to justify their existence. One tactic that Sheffield, Mo-Fi, and other companies employed was using the gold disc. The companies claimed that gold was better than silver for producing more precise, uniform pits for a CD laser to read, thus generating a more precise audio image. I almost always found that the gold products I reviewed did, indeed, sound better than their silver counterparts, usually appearing smoother and better detailed. Still, I always concluded my reviews of gold discs with the caution that I could never actually tell if the audio upgrade was the result of the disc’s gold plating or the result of better, more-careful remastering. So, now, with this Massenet disc, I had the chance to compare a well-made gold disc with a JVC XRCD24 remastering on silver, both made from the same master tapes.

My conclusions on the audio issue come at the end of the review, but first I’ll add a little something about the disc’s contents. The original EMI LP of Massenet’s Le Cid ballet music found its way to my attention quite by accident a couple of years after EMI made it back in 1971. You see, in the mid Seventies I was compiling a list of favorite audiophile records for a magazine article, and I had asked every music and audio lover I knew for their recommendations. Everybody contributed, from high-end audio dealers, audio engineers, and record and equipment reviewers to various friends professing “golden ears,” about thirty people in all. As you may have already guessed, this recording of Le Cid figured high in the final tally. It not only contained a great performance of the music, it sounded state-of-the-art.

As luck would have it, though, by the time I tried to buy the recording, EMI had already withdrawn their Studio Two vinyl disc that everybody loved so well and replaced it with a lower-priced issue in their Greensleeves line. Fortunately, it was still plenty good, with a tremendous dynamic range and a whopping big bass. The next time it showed up on LP in America was on the Klavier label. Then came the CD age, and it appeared both in EMI’s mid-priced Studio line and on a Klavier silver disc. The EMI release retained the vinyl’s warmth, but the slightly leaner-sounding Klavier disc seemed a bit more transparent. Then Klavier issued the recording on a 24-karat gold-plated disc that I eagerly sought out and still own. Unfortunately, Klavier didn’t keep it around for long, and today it’s rather hard to find and costly if you do find it. Ditto for their later XRCD24 silver disc.

The music on the album comprises bits and pieces of the orchestral score in Massenet’s opera, namely the second-act ballet, and conductor Fremaux and his Birmingham orchestra provide a vigorous, zesty rendition of the Spanish-flavored tunes. The story of the opera, of course, is based on Spain’s legendary hero, Rodrigo de Bivar, or “El Cid” (from the Arabic “Al Sid” or “Lord”) who in the eleventh century reclaimed the city of Valencia from the Moors and became the hero of one of Spain’s most significant medieval epic poems. Massenet’s music, which premiered in 1885, is tuneful, exciting, and highly Romantic by turns, and Maestro Fremaux provides it with exactly the zesty and exciting performance it needs. The disc’s accompanying music by Berlioz and Offenbach is equally well presented.

Producers David Mottley and Brian Culverhouse and engineers Stuart Eltham and Neville Boyling recorded the music for EMI Studio Two (the Le Cid music in 1971, as I said), and EMI originally released the vinyl LP in both two-channel stereo and four-channel Quadraphonic. Not long after, Klavier released the recording on LP and then later on silver disc. In 1994 engineer Bruce Leek remastered the original tapes for a Klavier gold disc, and some years after that JVC (Victor Company of Japan) remastered it once more, again for Klavier, this time using their meticulous XRCD24/K2 mastering and manufacturing processes, using JVC’s original analog mastering console, 24-bit K2 A/D converter, digital K2 interface, K2 rubidium master clock, and K2 laser cutter.

So, getting back to that question we started with: Which sounds better, the gold disc or the XRCD24 silver disc? Now, here’s the thing: I love the gold disc. It retained all the warmth of the LP that I remembered and with greater impact and definition than the ordinary compact disc. Consequently, I was eager to compare the gold disc to JVC’s XRCD24 silver transfer. Putting them into separate CD players and adjusting for a slight volume imbalance (the JVC plays about two decibels louder), I started switching back and forth. My findings were rather what I had expected. JVC’s silver disc was slightly more dynamic and exhibited slightly more transparency. By comparison, the gold disc sounded marginally smoother but softer. This is not, however, to say that the JVC transfer was brighter or edgier than the gold. Indeed, without the direct comparison, one would not even have considered such a thing. What was clear to me more than anything, though, was that the XRCD24/K2 silver disc seemed to have greater impact than the gold disc, something the original LP had in abundance.

Which still leaves me wondering whether it is gold plating that makes a difference in better sound or simply better remastering techniques. After this experience, though, I’m leaning more than ever on the idea of better mastering.

And what would the difference be between this XRCD24 on silver and the same XRCD24 on gold? I suspect no difference at all, but I doubt that we’ll ever find out.

JJP

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click below:

Meet the Staff

Meet the Staff
John J. Puccio, Founder and Contributor

Understand, I'm just an everyday guy reacting to something I love. And I've been doing it for a very long time, my appreciation for classical music starting with the musical excerpts on the Big Jon and Sparkie radio show in the early Fifties and the purchase of my first recording, The 101 Strings Play the Classics, around 1956. In the late Sixties I began teaching high school English and Film Studies as well as becoming interested in hi-fi, my audio ambitions graduating me from a pair of AR-3 speakers to the Fulton J's recommended by The Stereophile's J. Gordon Holt. In the early Seventies, I began writing for a number of audio magazines, including Audio Excellence, Audio Forum, The Boston Audio Society Speaker, The American Record Guide, and from 1976 until 2008, The $ensible Sound, for which I served as Classical Music Editor.

Today, I'm retired from teaching and use a pair of bi-amped VMPS RM40s loudspeakers for my listening. In addition to writing for the Classical Candor blog, I served as the Movie Review Editor for the Web site Movie Metropolis (formerly DVDTown) from 1997-2013. Music and movies. Life couldn't be better.

Karl Nehring, Editor and Contributor

For more than 20 years I was the editor of The $ensible Sound magazine and a regular contributor to both its equipment and recordings review pages. I would not presume to present myself as some sort of expert on music, but I have a deep love for and appreciation of many types of music, "classical" especially, and have listened to thousands of recordings over the years, many of which still line the walls of my listening room (and occasionally spill onto the furniture and floor, much to the chagrin of my long-suffering wife). I have always taken the approach as a reviewer that what I am trying to do is simply to point out to readers that I have come across a recording that I have found of interest, a recording that I think they might appreciate my having pointed out to them. I suppose that sounds a bit simple-minded, but I know I appreciate reading reviews by others that do the same for me — point out recordings that they think I might enjoy.

For readers who might be wondering about what kind of system I am using to do my listening, I should probably point out that I do a LOT of music listening and employ a variety of means to do so in a variety of environments, as I would imagine many music lovers also do. Starting at the more grandiose end of the scale, the system in which I do my most serious listening comprises Marantz CD 6007 and Onkyo CD 7030 CD players, NAD C 658 streaming preamp/DAC, Legacy Audio PowerBloc2 amplifier, and a pair of Legacy Audio Focus SE loudspeakers. I occasionally do some listening through pair of Sennheiser 560S headphones. I miss the excellent ELS Studio sound system in our 2016 Acura RDX (now my wife's daily driver) on which I had ripped more than a hundred favorite CDs to the hard drive, so now when driving my 2022 Accord EX-L Hybrid I stream music from my phone through its adequate but not outstanding factory system. For more casual listening at home when I am not in my listening room, I often stream music through the phone into a Vizio soundbar system that has tolerably nice sound for such a diminutive physical presence. And finally, at the least grandiose end of the scale, I have an Ultimate Ears Wonderboom II Bluetooth speaker for those occasions where I am somewhere by myself without a sound system but in desperate need of a musical fix. I just can’t imagine life without music and I am humbly grateful for the technology that enables us to enjoy it in so many wonderful ways.

William (Bill) Heck, Webmaster and Contributor

Among my early childhood memories are those of listening to my mother playing records (some even 78 rpm ones!) of both classical music and jazz tunes. I suppose that her love of music was transmitted genetically, and my interest was sustained by years of playing in rock bands – until I realized that this was no way to make a living. The interest in classical music was rekindled in grad school when the university FM station serving as background music for studying happened to play the Brahms First Symphony. As the work came to an end, it struck me forcibly that this was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard, and from that point on, I never looked back. This revelation was to the detriment of my studies, as I subsequently spent way too much time simply listening, but music has remained a significant part of my life. These days, although I still can tell a trumpet from a bassoon and a quarter note from a treble clef, I have to admit that I remain a nonexpert. But I do love music in general and classical music in particular, and I enjoy sharing both information and opinions about it.

The audiophile bug bit about the same time that I returned to classical music. I’ve gone through plenty of equipment, brands from Audio Research to Yamaha, and the best of it has opened new audio insights. Along the way, I reviewed components, and occasionally recordings, for The $ensible Sound magazine. Most recently I’ve moved to my “ultimate system” consisting of a BlueSound Node streamer, an ancient Toshiba multi-format disk player serving as a CD transport, Legacy Wavelet II DAC/preamp/crossover, dual Legacy PowerBloc2 amps, and Legacy Signature SE speakers (biamped), all connected with decently made, no-frills cables. With the arrival of CD and higher resolution streaming, that is now the source for most of my listening.

Ryan Ross, Contributor

I started listening to and studying classical music in earnest nearly three decades ago. This interest grew naturally out of my training as a pianist. I am now a musicologist by profession, specializing in British and other symphonic music of the 19th and 20th centuries. My scholarly work has been published in major music journals, as well as in other outlets. Current research focuses include twentieth-century symphonic historiography, and the music of Jean Sibelius, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Malcolm Arnold.

I am honored to contribute writings to Classical Candor. In an age where the classical recording industry is being subjected to such profound pressures and changes, it is more important than ever for those of us steeped in this cultural tradition to continue to foster its love and exposure. I hope that my readers can find value, no matter how modest, in what I offer here.


Bryan Geyer, Technical Analyst

I initially embraced classical music in 1954 when I mistuned my car radio and heard the Heifetz recording of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto. That inspired me to board the new "hi-fi" DIY bandwagon. In 1957 I joined one of the pioneer semiconductor makers and spent the next 32 years marketing transistors and microcircuits to military contractors. Home audio DIY projects remained a personal passion until 1989 when we created our own new photography equipment company. I later (2012) revived my interest in two channel audio when we "downsized" our life and determined that mini-monitors + paired subwoofers were a great way to mate fine music with the space constraints of condo living.

Visitors that view my technical papers on this site may wonder why they appear here, rather than on a site that features audio equipment reviews. My reason is that I tried the latter, and prefer to publish for people who actually want to listen to music; not to equipment. My focus is in describing what's technically beneficial to assure that the sound of the system will accurately replicate the source input signal (i. e. exhibit high accuracy) without inordinate cost and complexity. Conversely, most of the audiophiles of today strive to achieve sound that's euphonic, i.e. be personally satisfying. In essence, audiophiles seek sound that's consistent with their desire; the music is simply a test signal.

Mission Statement

It is the goal of Classical Candor to promote the enjoyment of classical music. Other forms of music come and go--minuets, waltzes, ragtime, blues, jazz, bebop, country-western, rock-'n'-roll, heavy metal, rap, and the rest--but classical music has been around for hundreds of years and will continue to be around for hundreds more. It's no accident that every major city in the world has one or more symphony orchestras.

When I was young, I heard it said that only intellectuals could appreciate classical music, that it required dedicated concentration to appreciate. Nonsense. I'm no intellectual, and I've always loved classical music. Anyone who's ever seen and enjoyed Disney's Fantasia or a Looney Tunes cartoon playing Rossini's William Tell Overture or Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 can attest to the power and joy of classical music, and that's just about everybody.

So, if Classical Candor can expand one's awareness of classical music and bring more joy to one's life, more power to it. It's done its job. --John J. Puccio

Contact Information

Readers with polite, courteous, helpful letters may send them to classicalcandor@gmail.com

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"Their Master's Voice" by Michael Sowa

"Their Master's Voice" by Michael Sowa